Carolina Gold
{{Short description|Variety of rice}}
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{{Infobox cultivar
| name = Carolina Gold rice
| image = Skilled African Labor (7222778658).jpg
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| image_caption = Enslaved Africans cultivating Carolina gold rice in South Carolina on Snee farm plantation.
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| genus =
| species = Oryza glaberrima (Steud.)
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| origin = South Carolina Lowcountry and the Sea Islands
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}}
Carolina Gold rice is a variety of African rice first popularized in South Carolina, USA in the 1780s.{{cite web |title=America’s oldest rice emanates from the time of our revolution in the rice fields around Charleston, South Carolina |url=http://www.thecarolinagoldricefoundation.org/carolinagoldrice |website=Carolina Gold Rice Foundation |access-date=2 June 2021}} It is named for the golden color of its unhulled grains.{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o6CsDwAAQBAJ |pages=12-14 |title=Carolina's Golden Fields: Inland Rice Cultivation in the South Carolina Lowcountry, 1670–1860 |series=Cambridge Studies on the American South |first=Hayden R. |last=Smith |publisher=Cambridge UP |year=2019 |isbn=9781108423403}}
History
Rice was grown in South Carolina (in the South Carolina Lowcountry) by enslaved people, and led to enormous wealth. It was a staple of Lowcountry cuisine, and at the outset of the Civil War, 3.5 million of the 5 million bushels of rice produced in the United States were Carolina Gold rice. Over subsequent decades it declined in popularity until the last commercial crop was harvested in 1927.{{cite news |last1=Martin Taylor |first1=John |title=Carolina Gold: A Rare Harvest |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/12/28/garden/carolina-gold-a-rare-harvest.html |access-date=2 June 2021 |publisher=New York Times |date=December 28, 1988}}
In the 1980s, Dr. Richard and Patricia Schulze became interested in the variety while restoring rice ponds on their vacation property in Hardeeville, South Carolina. They found out that a USDA center on rice research in Texas had retained a stock of it in its seed bank. After obtaining and planting {{convert|14|lb}}, they harvested {{convert|64|lb}} pounds in the first season. By 1988, they were harvesting {{convert|10000|lb}} pounds per year.
Two commercial efforts, Anson Mills and Carolina Plantation Rice, began selling the variety to the general public in 1998, after an effort at Clemson University had bred a disease-resistant strain. While Riviana Foods sells rice under the brand name Carolina Rice, including a parboiled variety called Carolina Gold, these share no connection to the variety of the name.{{Cite web |last=Pandolfi |first=Keith |date=May 2016 |title=The Story of Carolina Gold, the Best Rice You've Never Tasted |url=https://www.seriouseats.com/carolina-gold-heirloom-rice-anson-mills |access-date=2021-12-11 |website=Serious Eats |language=en}}
The Carolina Gold Rice Foundation was created in 2004 to help popularize, restore and preserve the heirloom rice.{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5m3_BgAAQBAJ |pages=x-xi |title=Southern Provisions: The Creation and Revival of a Cuisine |first=David S. |last=Shields |publisher=U of Chicago P |year=2015 |isbn=9780226141114}} It has since expanded to other heirlooms such as French Huguenot black landrace buckwheat, Sea Island red peas, and others.{{Cite news|last=Ardis|first=Susan|date=2016-08-17|title=In Lower Richland fields, Carolina Gold Rice Foundation resurrects crops lost to time|work=The Herald|url=https://www.heraldonline.com/living/article96120762.html|access-date=2021-12-11}}